Leaderboard

I think I have finished the finishing now, so I just need to bolt it all together (and wire it etc)

Failed promises?

Sarcastic comments like this are one reason why my visits here are growing more and more infrequent. You’re a moderator too. The OP is mostly talking about how little the insured value is. My comment actually says something quite different, i.e that instruments aren’t covered at all, which is the case with parcelforce and possibly others.

Available in Small, Medium, Large, Extra Large, and Made In Texas Medium.

Crack a whip why don't you? Heeheehee. There will be a link but we haven't finished assembling the bits to go on the other end of it yet. Have no fear however, Basschat elves are busy behind the scenes creating the pilot episode for your appraisal. We're aiming for the end of June when we hope to launch the very first one. It's early days. It's also encouraging to see the positive reaction to the project. Thank you.

May be a little late to the party on these, but I bought a set last week (45-100), and fitted them to my US Geddy Lee Jazz. Wow! They are really excellent. I used to use the standard XL strings for some years, but the last few, I've been using Fender flats. Tried some Fender nickels on the bass, and they just didn't cut it. Did some research.....looked at DR....lots of various materials/compounds, but stumbled across the NYXL's. Fitted them last week, and the bass was transformed. It was great before, but these have made it take off - love the tension, feel, balance, can't fault them at all. They feel really nice of the fingers, quite soft - I'm assuming they'll be kind to the frets as well, feeling like they do! Not the cheapest, but if anyone is considering a set, give them a try. Definitely feel a league above the 'standard' XL....and the packaging is awesome as well! Well done D'addario. You've won me back! 😁

Very quick response from Bass Direct who have put a replacement in the post immediately. They pass the test - great service

Today I cut the fret slots into the fretboards and scribed one of the neck joints to the body. I also played around with the Rocklite to see how it worked compared to real wood, in short, easier but I'll update the Rocklite thread with that The fretslots look as if they don't line up in this photo but they do (honest ) Marked out one of the fretboards for the Mother of Pearl markers. Here's what I did: Stuck a bit of masking tape over each fret gap to be inlayed. Marked the centre line of the board, marked the centre line of each fret gap. Marked the fret number on each inlay and the centre lines of each. Stuck masking tape to the bottom of each inlay and cut off the waste with a scalpel. Marked the position with a pencil of each inlay on the fretboard. Put a blob of superglue on the masking tape and put the inlay masking tape down on the fretboard and squared it off with a set square. Marked the fretboard with a scalpel very carefully. Peeled off the masking tape, the inlay and removed the masking tape from the bottom and put t hem carefully to one side. Tomorrow I'll rout out the inlay holes, I ran out of time today

Oooohh errrr missus 😁

For me the joy of live performance is playing brilliant crafted songs as a band and entertaining the audience, and I'm not going to let a some discrepancy in my sound ruin that. With programmable effects my sound for any given song is exactly the same every time and if it isn't that means that there is something very wrong acoustically with the venue, which is beyond my ability to correct and therefore it is pointless to worry about it.

My studio: In the box digital all running through a class A summing mixer and a Rupert Neve designed Amek comp/lim. All the flexibility and power of digital and some lush analogue width and depth.

Absolutely. My point, albeit badly made, is that I'd wager most people can't tell the difference between digital and analog. You can. I like to think I can too. But we're in a minority. If you put a UA plug-in up against its analog counterpart, only the keenest of ears would hear a noticeable difference; fewer still if they weren't told to notice the difference at all. And I say this as someone who's an analog evangelist. I own analog gear and would choose it over digital every single time. It sounds better quicker; but with patience I can get my digital tools to sounds nearly as good most of the time. Outside the studio in the context of, say, a pub gig... the difference is IMO negligible with hefty diminishing returns. That said, there are certainly some applications where digital still has a long way to go in terms of truly emulating analog: compression being one and summing being another. Reverb? Always digital for me. EQ? I use analog for colour and digital for surgical. But that's another topic...

NBD! Love this...... looks, feels, plays and sounds superb. Epiphone have surpassed themselves with the Vintage Pro Thunderbird! I'd never waste my money on a new Gibson when this is so good.....

I dropped in on my way up the M40 last week. I needed strings but also had £2k in my bass fund pot so thought I'd check out what toys they had. They had the strings I wanted but seemed so keen to usher me out of the door that I didn't even look at basses. Instead I've spent most of it on here lol. I love the idea of the shop and have had great experiences there before but it just mystifies me how the service can be so up and down. 21 pages of divided opinion and still going says it all really for me.

I've recently picked up a Brandoni acoustic bass for using in my bluegrass/blues/jazz band and am absolutely loving it! I was using a Japanese Mustang bass (which I also love) but it didn't really fit in with the acoustic vibe of the band. I've tried numerous semi/hollow basses but none have felt right like the Mustang does. Then I stumbled across the Brandoni in Wunjo and was instantly smitten. It's essentially an acoustic guitar body converted to bass, but the tailpiece style means that short scale strings can be used. I ditched the stock roundwound strings and added some Labella 60-115 white tapewounds. The fatter strings nicely offset the 26" scale and it feels great to play. It sounds warm, and gives us the double bass kinda sound I wanted. I just wanted to see if anyone else is playing one of these? (Picture before I changed the strings)

Hi all, I thought id share this here - as im pretty appalled at what a lot of us may be falling victim to. Did you know, that when sending an amp or speaker via a courier or courier comparison site, and you pay for your amp and/or speaker to be insured for its full amount for peace of mind - that you are actually only covered for 'upto' £200 damages - not its full value ? Its in the hidden prohibited and restrictions list in companies such as dpd. Im appalled as they actually ask you to follow there proceedure and insure your parcel for its full value, which you do - and pay handsomely for - and they then confirm to you that its fully insured for its full value - only to find its not insured to anywhere near its value once theyve taken your cash and you have a legitimate claim. Its a terrible con - and i urge everyone to thoroughly check before sending ANY amp, speaker or cab via courier. Judging by how many amps and cabs are for sale on here, and how many offer postage for high price items, i thought id let people know. heres DPDs sneaky page: https://www.dpdlocal-online.co.uk/prohibited-items amps and cabs are in the not mentioned special provisions items section at the bottom. oh! - and just done a double check - GUITARS (and basses) are only insured for £100 - and must be sent in a hard case. i certainly wont be sending anything ever again.

It looks really good aidan63. and it’s great fun building your own this is one I did it started life as a blue basic squire I stripped it and sprayed it shell pink And upgraded all of it stained and polished the fretboard. I’m a carpenter/cabinetmaker and polisher by trade it’s fitted with tapewound strings sounds really mellow

Random road closures after the gig when you just want to get home

+1 - I read glowing reviews of their C-1 condenser while I was looking to upgrade my home recording setup, so I took a punt on two of them. Turns out they were good enough to record a solo EP with!

1. Guitarists who make miniscule, imperceptible adjustments to their sound in between songs, delaying the start of the next song and killing any momentum (and emptying the dancefloor in process). 2. Members who have a long list of reasons why they can't possibly drive or help bring any gear to the next gig, because they're drinking/meeting friends there etc - so can you take all their stuff instead? 3. Alternative to 2, "So can i borrow your guitar/amp/PA etc instead for the gig?" 4. In the case of 3, then won't lift a finger to help you set up the gear that's for them, or pack it down or load it out afterwards. 5. Musicians who pick songs for the band to do 'because they are easy' rather than 'because they are good.'

I can vouch for that! As I have the plasticky Dremel version does that mean that I should be twice as envious of Christine's toys as I am of yours or as you are of Christine's? It's a quality of plunge that I have yet to experience.

^^ Yes! But I've also come round to the view that if the "only fecker who's going to notice my overly deep filter sweep or bright distortion is me" well that's plenty good enough reason if it makes me / us enjoy playing more. Where I draw the line is when my or another band member's personal enjoyment of these nuances of sound / tone gets in the way of the overall band performance / audience enjoyment e.g. because a band member is faffing about between songs tweaking his pedal board resulting in 'dead air time'. It's at that point the rest of the band needs to push back. And that's kinda exactly where we are with our guitarist and his analogue pedals, adjusting between every song (when he's not re-tuning his guitar or breaking his strings - which he did once immediately before the encore; he's been under a three line whip to bring a spare guitar to every gig since!)

Haha! I did think of you Al as I was typing the word 'compression' To clarify, digital compression can certainly go a great job of it. I have some superb digital compressors (albeit plug-ins rather than stomp boxes) that I don't hesitate to use. In fact, when I want the compressor to be 'transparent' (i.e. have minimal imprint on the tone) then digital is sometimes the better option: digital generally does 'clean' very well by its nature. However, when I want to impart some colour then I nearly always opt for analog - and I think the musicality of a good, analog compressor set right is very difficult to emulate digitally. At least I've never quite managed it myself with plug-ins. All that said, it does depend a lot on what price point we're talking about. Up to a few hundred quid, I'd argue (from my own experience) that the difference between analog and digital compressors is negligible. Just choose whatever product you find is easiest or most convenient to use. Once you get above £1000 or so, the difference between analog and digital compressors is stark. I'm lucky to have access to a friend's studio, which features several high-end compressors, and they literally blow my plug-ins out of the water. But these aren't the sort of units you'd ever want to lug around to gigs. So in short: for a gigging bass player, digital compression is absolutely fine and the Helix products that I've toyed with sound great in that regard (I'm not familiar with the TC Spectracomp so can't comment on that). What matters most is the user's knowledge in setting up the compressor correctly. That knowledge is priceless but it does take time and patience to acquire... and I'm still very much working on it myself!

I think my first course of action would be to try an application of switch cleaner on the selector.

If I need a different tone, I just pick the appropriate patch on my Helix. Job Done. Also I would never take any new device (or even a new bass) to a gig (or even a rehearsal) until I was familiar enough with it for me not to be spending all my time fiddling between songs. The first time I used my Helix at rehearsal I had the spend maybe a minute after each song adjusting some of the effects parameters from what I thought would work at home to what I could tell I needed once I'd used them in the band context. At the second rehearsal I still had a little bit of work to do on the more complex and exacting tones. By the fourth rehearsal I had all the patches sorted and programmed in the correct order for the set. With all my sounds being set up before I play I don't really need any real-time control. There's one expression pedal built-in (and connections for adding two more) which can be assigned to any parameter(s) I want. There's a tap-tempo switch which will synchronise any effects that require it. Everything else is done by setting up my patches before hand. And in 30 years of using programmable effects I've never been in a situation where I've needed to tweak my settings for an unfamiliar environment. I set up my bass rig, switch on, and there is my sound ready to play. Leaving aside the fact that EQ is not the right tool for correcting room problems (it can fix the problem in one place in the room - usually where you are standing - and probably make it worse in 2 others out in the audience, and you can make a bigger different most of the time by moving the direction your bass rig is pointing in), the Helix has a global EQ setting which could be used to tailor the overall sound for a particularly problematic environment. For the vast majority of my gigs what the audience hears of my bass is through the PA (which is why I've dumped my amp and cabs in favour of a powered FRFR cab) and as long as I can hear myself and a reasonable mix of the other instruments on stage, I'm happy. Chasing your tone at a pub gig, or when you have less than 30 minutes to set up and sound check the whole band who are sandwiched into the tiny bit of stage left over after the big-name headliners have set up all their gear, is for bands who aren't going to be asked back to play/support again. I want to be set up and ready to play with the minimum amount of fuss, and the Helix lets me do that.

It's a great little unit, enjoy.

What a mindblast!

And that'll be the trussrod and nordstrand pickups, then

Any clear coat will tend to darken the wood - except for the finish that @Andyjr1515 used on the Psilos build recently (which contains a hint of white pigment to keep it light) Make sure the first coat is flattened nicely, then another coat of sealer and gentle sand back should do. You'll then want to apply 2 or 3 coats of lacquer with only gentle sanding between coats. You don't want to burn through to the sealer. Then you can lay on more coats to finish as required. What lacquer are you using? Nitrocellulouse is a bit more forgiving because the coats merge together. Poly will form distinct layers so you need to be a bit more careful with the sanding to avoid burning through - you'll see witness lines if you do. Oil finishes such as tru-oil can also be polished up to a high gloss if you have the patience to do so. Most types of lacquer need careful attention to the health and safety warnings - it's not nice stuff to be breathing in!

is there a link to BC podcast?

especially when they shut roads you've sat navved to in the middle of nowhere and you have no bloomin idea where you are

You lot leave toys and plunging out of my thread!!

Oh dear, I feel the same. Recently I bought an Elite Precision but frankly, as a weekend warrior, I don't feel worthy to be playing it in public. One thing I'm not.....is Elite.

I've just bought the Vinyl LP of Ogdens' Nut Gone Flake on impulse. (For anyone in marketing, the sleeve made the sale.) I wasn't familiar with the album as a whole so when I got to Side Two it blew me away. Side one ends with the classic single Lazy Sunday. Turn the album over and Stanley Unwin takes you for a fanciful ride as he narrates the Small Faces version of an original fairy tale about a boy called Happiness Stan. The tale unfolds over the entire second side in six tracks with Stanley (mis)guiding you through the story in a way that you think you understand but; do you really? He starts the tale with the words: "Are you all sitty comfibold two-square on your botty? Then I'll begin..." Masterpiece!

That is a pain and will be fixed when they finally release the new mobile app.

Nah, for Bedroom Noodler insetr Custom Shop, lol

Ooh. That looks nicer than my Stewmac Dremel router base - which doesn't really plunge or have a decent depth stop. I usually have to set it to depth then tighten everything up to stop it vibrating loose. At least it's more stable than the official Dremel offering though

And there I was thinking that a Culture Vulture was a large chicken with an insatiable appetite for yoghurt! You live and learn.

I get the impression he's a one man band, so he won't have the overheads of the bigger companies. He makes a high quality product, there's no doubt about that. My split coil 51 Telebass pickup is lush. On the strength of it I'm buying a split coil neck pickup for my Jazz.

I prefer analogue however, I don't use effects on bass at all but the guitarist side of me does. I have always preferred the analogue effects. Not because they do their sound changing job better than digital but because the natural tone of the guitar is less compromised when the pedal is on or bypassed/off than with digital. I have found if I plug direct into my amp with nothing in between, that gives me the best sound and is what I do mostly, if I plug into an analogue pedal with it off, then there is sometimes a slight change the tone of my guitar and I guess that is less with a true bypass pedal. However, Digital effects to me seem to remove a lot of the tone out of an instrument especially bottom and lower mids and seem to accentuate the highs and hence sound thin. When I was touring the band leader wanted lots of effects on the guitar as it was Indian/reggae fusion so after trying a few multi effects pedals I settled on a boss unit first and after a day trying it out at home and at rehearsal i hated it and swapped for a Line 6 XT-Pro which was marginally better. Unfortunately both of them stripped the life out of my guitar tone and when I called both companies for advice on why that was I was told that even with everything off the signal still goes through the ADDA converter and if you want to keep your natural tone you need to programme it back in using the EQ settings!!! In the end i got an AB line switcher and only switched in the digital unit when I needed those effects and kept it out of the loop most of the time. I appreciate there may have been a huge improvement in the technology now as the two guitarists in my main band use Boss muiti effects units and swear by them but there is still a big difference between their natural guitar sounds and the sound through the pedal with it off. They are both good players and the pedals are part of their sound and it works for them. If I end up using pedals on bass it will be analogue unless the digital technology has improved massively. Either way I think I would prefer to have some kind of blender so I can always have the dry signal and add as much or as little of the effects to it rather than have the whole bass signal with the effect on. LONG LIVE ANALOGUE!

Happy to (sometimes, at least) do wot it says on the tin! All a matter of personal taste - and I'm entirely aware of the fact I possess none. No offence intended!

I had a set of Di Marzio DP126 in a PJ and they were awesome. Happened to notice that Dood has a set for sale on here so you could also save a few squids.

My Line 6 Bass Pod XT Live does everything I could want for live work. If I was to replace it with anything, it'd be a Helix or similar. I can't see me ever going back to individual stomps. So for me, yes they've pretty much had their day.

I have an 80s Aria Pro that is fantastic, light, great sound and one the best necks I have played. Bought for peanuts.

My brother used to run his own company producing merch for bands. (He tells a story of Radiohead's tour manager phoning him up saying they needed 500 t-shirts in Madrid the next day. He did it.) He insisted on everything he supplied being top quality, and would turn down orders from bands who wanted cheap flimsy stuff. His view was that when peeps buy a t-shirt at a gig they're going to cherish it and the memories that go with it, they'll want to wear it to that band's gigs for years, and to sell them something that's going to fall apart or lose its print after three times through a washing machine would just be unacceptable. Admittedly a BassChat t-shirt would probably have less emotional value and be easier to replace than one from the only time in your life you got to see your very favourite band 🙂 but the principle holds imho.

Well mate I phoned saying saying I'd swap my imperfect sunburst they sent me last week for another one as I couldn't be bothered to wait for the Ebony ones to arrive. the guy on the phone said oh wait we've just had a delivery of Ebony ones in (I didn't have one on order) Today this arrived